Bitcoin

The Pan African Currency Union based on bitcoin replaces US $ as reserve currency. Headline found in Business Insider dated 2025.

This is science fiction, which is a fun way to speculate on the future – just ask Arthur C Clark, the science fiction writer who is credited with the idea for geo stationary satellites for telecommunications in 1945. Warning: the value of Bitcoin can go down as well as up. Please don’t bet your kid’s college fund on this outcome. I thought about interviewing real experts on the subject of Pan African Monetary Union by reaching out to crypto experts in Africa and people at the World Bank, but figured that nobody sensible would want their names associated with an idea as crazy as this.

Here is how the story unfolded: 2016: the politicians in the member states of Africa could not agree among themselves on how to create a Pan African currency, so the idea of using Bitcoin starts to circulate in policy journals and it gets the label AfriCoin. 2017: America, Japan and ECB export inflation through money printing.
Untitled. Counterparty. 80% of Bitcoin is exchanged into and out of Chinese yuan. In a report out today from Goldman Sachs about the future of money, the bank points out that 80% of bitcoin volume is now exchanged into and out of Chinese yuan.

The second-highest trading currency is the US dollar, followed by smaller denominations in yen and euros. The revelation of China’s bitcoin trading dominance seems to defy the logic that tight government restrictions would depress bitcoin’s adoption in the world’s largest economy. The amount of bitcoin trading activity in China has also risen, despite bitcoin’s precipitous price fall from last year’s $1,000-plus highs to less than $300 today. The Chinese bitcoin surge comes against a backdrop of waning confidence in the Chinese economy, as the yuan weakens against the strengthening dollar and capital outflows—once rare in China—increase at record rates. The fact that China has become a major mining hub is a likely contributor to its high bitcoin transaction volume, according to a report from the U.S.

British Banking Association: Bitcoin is a Real Threat to Banks. As cryptocurrencies grow in popularity, they will continue to threaten revenue streams of the traditional banking system, according to a new report from the British Banking Association (BBA).

A section of The Digital Disruption: UK Banking Report looks specifically at cryptocurrencies and the impact they have already had, and will continue to have, on people's perceptions of monetary transfer. "Cryptocurrencies increasingly look like becoming ubiquitous challengers to more familiar, established currencies.
Untitled. Gemini. Amid Bitcoin's Bloodbath, Silence From Silicon Valley Press. As I'm sure you're aware, oil prices have cratered, from $85 a year ago to just $46 today.

That's nothing. The value of Bitcoin, which peaked in November of 2013 at $1242, has dropped from $847 in January of 2014 to all of $201 today. Heck, it dropped 32% in two days this week! Bitcoin has since bounced, up 19% to $210 yesterday. Now granted, most people could not care less about Bitcoin. But in Silicon Valley, it's a big deal.
Bit Coin Review. UBS CIO: Blockchain Technology Can Massively Simplify Banking. Why Bitcoin advocates might like New York’s new proposed rules for virtual currency. One of New York's top financial regulators is laying out a new policy on Bitcoin and other virtual currencies after a flood of public feedback encouraged the agency to scale back its proposed rules.

New revisions to the proposal would trim some requirements on Bitcoin-related businesses, and clarify others. Among the key changes? Companies covered by the regulations will no longer be required to store the addresses of every person involved in a Bitcoin transaction — an idea privacy hawks have said would deter people from adopting virtual currencies. Now, companies regulated by New York's so-called BitLicense will only be required to gather transaction information from their own customers, said Ben Lawsky, New York's superintendent of financial services, at a Washington conference Thursday. In addition, covered companies will only have to store that information for seven years, down from the 10 years Lawsky's agency, the department of financial services, was previously considering.
Microsoft now accepts Bitcoin across all of its online stores: Windows, Xbox, apps, everything.

There might be life in the old beast yet: Microsoft now accepts Bitcoin as a payment option on its Windows and Xbox stores — which means you can now use Bitcoin to purchase a new copy of Windows, the latest installment of Call of Destiny: Master Chief Edition, or even to buy the latest season of your favorite TV show.

Obviously, this is a pretty big deal for Bitcoin: Not only is a currency only as valuable as its ability to be exchanged for useful goods, but an endorsement from a company as large as Microsoft will be seen as a significant milestone that might get other important companies to take another look at accepting Bitcoin. As of yesterday morning, you can now use bitcoins to add funds to your Microsoft account.
Bitcoin Gets More Respect From Major Brands. Bitcoin has survived skepticism, economic volatility and outright hostility from entrenched financial institutions since it was created by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008.

But now, it's starting to seep into the global economy as more big brands are stepping out in support of the digital currency. Time Inc. is the latest company to announce it’s accepting the virtual currency for subscriptions to many of its magazines, including Fortune, Health, This Old House and Travel and Leisure. “For a major publisher like Time Inc. to embrace Bitcoin sends an important message to both its readers and to the broader media community,” said Brian Armstrong, CEO and co-founder of Coinbase (Time Inc.'
S Bitcoin processor), according to the New York Times. Microsoft is also now acceping Bitcoin for some online purchases via the BitPay currency exchange, which can now be used for purchases on Windows Store or at stores that sell Xbox Games, Xbox Music or Xbox Video.

Bitreserve - A next generation digital money service built on top of bitcoin.
The Blockchain and the Rise of Networked Trust. “We are free to plant our own seeds; we don’t buy the brand nor the patent from a multinational.

In order to plant, we don’t need permission. Also, we don’t ask anyone’s permission for what to do with our money!” Santiago Zaz is an organic farmer from Argentina. Back in 2013, Zaz’s business became the first of its kind to accept bitcoin payments in the country.
Linked-In, Sun Microsystems Founders Lead Big Bet On Bitcoin Innovation - MoneyBeat - WSJ. 37coins. State of Bitcoin Q3 2014: Ecosystem Maturing Amid Price Pressure. Download the full report in PDF form.

We are pleased to release our latest quarterly State of Bitcoin update. This article will run through some key findings from the new report, which focuses on data and events in the third quarter of 2014 up to the present day. Overall, this quarter could be characterized as a ‘Tale of Two Bitcoins’.
Overstock.com Assembles Coders to Create a Bitcoin-Like Stock Market. Ariel Zambelich/WIRED.

Coin design: Gail Anderson + Joe Newton Overstock.com is building software, based on the bitcoin digital currency, that could allow the big-name etailer to issue corporate stock over the internet, sidestepping traditional stock exchanges such as the NASDAQ and the New York Stock Exchange. The Salt Lake City-based company recently hired two of the developers behind CounterParty—an online project that helps individuals and businesses build all sorts of financial services atop the worldwide network of machines that drive bitcoin—and according to Overstock founder and CEO Patrick Byrne, these coders will help build “cryptosecurity” software that any company could potentially use to issue financial securities over the net.

Dark Markets Grow Bigger and Bolder in Year Since Silk Road Bust. In this concluding article of our series looking at Silk Road, a year after its closure, we examine the impact the Silk Road bust had on the dark markets and their most widely used digital currency, bitcoin. The FBI may have taken down the Silk Road in spectacular fashion, slapping a seizure notice on the dark marketplace’s website and executing the high-profile public arrests of Ross Ulbricht, and later, bitcoin executive Charlie Shrem and digital currency trader Robert Faiella. According to academics and researchers studying dark web markets – which transact almost exclusively in bitcoin – listings for illicit goods and services have actually grown in the aftermath of the Silk Road bust.

The rising popularity of such markets among drug vendors and customers means that illicit trade is set to expand even more, one researcher believes.
How Bitcoin's Banking Crunch is Holding Back US Startups. Following its May launch, QuickCoin captured attention with its novel integration of Facebook’s ubiquitous social media platform and simple bitcoin wallet technology – and the wider tech world took notice. Soon, the self-funded company began to capitalize on its momentum, and on 11th August, QuickCoin had the first of its seed round capital wired to its corporate bank account at Wells Fargo.

The celebration, however, was short-lived. As CEO Nathan Lands told CoinDesk: “Everything seemed fine, when all of a sudden I started noticing that some of our bills were bouncing because the debit card was being declined.” Lands alleges that weeks of uncertainty ensued, and that in the end, QuickCoin’s bank account was closed. The result is that ultimately, the San Francisco-based company was forced to explore other options, including looking offshore, for its banking needs.
Bitcoin Could Transform Internet of Things into Vast Data Marketplace.

As sportswear giant Nike expands its wearable technology applications, it will need more data to feed its gadgets and software. To do that will be a simple matter in the future. A Nike executive will simply pull up a list of sensors operated by a private weather station, selecting the ones from which she would like to buy data. With a click, the executive will pay individual sensors – perhaps thermostats mounted in a Central Park pathway particularly favoured by joggers – for their data, using bitcoin. The weather sensors will be just one part of a future market filled with data collected by machines on the ‘Internet of Things’. The only difference would be that humans will now be able to pay the machines directly for their work, in bitcoin.
Revolutionizing Crowdfunding. Bitcoin reports by banks. Bills.Ninja. Kryptoradio by Koodilehto. Bitcoin: the Stripe perspective. Many people have remarked that Bitcoin resembles the internet in the early 90s: we haven’t yet built the Googles that will make it accessible or the Facebooks and Netflixes that will make it broadly useful.

So it's an open question: what might a Bitcoin that's useful for the mainstream look like? Money Money has three functions: it’s a store of value (that is, somewhere you can put your life savings), a unit of account (that is, a measure of value), and a medium of exchange (a way to transport value). On the first two fronts, Bitcoin has shown promise in high-inflation economies, but it’s a much tougher sell for mainstream consumers in stable countries. There, consumers mostly want a safe place to hold their savings, and the existing bank account insurances and consumer protections have set a high bar.
Ripple Labs Unveils Proposal for New Smart Contract System. San Francisco-based Ripple Labs, a startup focused on building payment and digital assets networks, has unveiled a comprehensive plan for the development of a new smart contract system. Called Codius, the proposed system will be programming language agnostic and will be able to work with existing monetary and contractual systems.

There are a few projects in the works for building smart contract solutions that involve cryptography. But Ripple Labs‘ Codius effort is perhaps a framework that many in the cyrptocurrency space have been searching for in order to build asset structures.
Sending Money Made Easy using Bitcoin. Bitcoin crowdfunder Swarm launches, raises $720,000 in 18 hours » CoinReport. A case against Proof of Stake Velocity - Dogeconomist. ﻿Peercoin - Secure & Sustainable Cryptocoin.
Exciting New Innovations From Reddcoin. " Originally appeared on The CoinFront - Your Online Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency News Authority.
Bitcoin Poorly Explained. The Five Biggest Threats Facing Bitcoin. Bitcoin Storage. In the Bitcoin world, half the wealth belongs to the 0.1 percent. Darkcoin, the Shadowy Cousin of Bitcoin, Is Booming. The state of Bitcoin in Southeast Asia. Wayne is an analyst with Venture Scanner, a Silicon Valley-based firm that helps corporate innovation arms and investors identify innovation trends and opportunities, using a combination of big data and analyst insights.

Bitcoin Is Hiring Lobbyists. Lets Talk Bitcoin.

Speculation

MIT is about to become the world's first Bitcoin economy. What would happen if every undergraduate student on a campus got $100 in Bitcoins?
Cognitive biases that make people skeptical towards Bitcoin.
Mt Gox. Square Market Accepts Bitcoin. March 31, 2014. What the Fork was that? A forking post mortem.
Why The Bitcoin Industry Must Recognise Its Responsibilities. In One Month, Everyone In Iceland Will Own Cryptocurrency. Bitcoins + Banks. UBS investment report declares bitcoin “Problematic currency, interesting payment system”
Trojans and Bots. Hidden surprises in the Bitcoin blockchain and how they are stored: Nelson Mandela, Wikileaks, photos, and Python software.